Aristotle argues that happiness is the ultimate good and purpose of human action. He believes that virtue is the way to achieve happiness. Does this view offer a reason for thinking that ethics might have a general character that can be applied to all people, places, and times? Can someone be fully happy (in Aristotle’s sense, that is, fulfilled, excellent, flourishing) even though others might consider them wicked?
Does virtue or piety capture what we mean by morals and ethics or is something lost in these characterizations? When Plato and Euthyphro discuss piety, they seem to treat piety as if it were another word for ethical, that is, if a person is pious then they do the right thing while an impious person does not. Similarly, Aristotle’s entire work on ethics is concerned with the development of virtue. But is virtue or piety all there is to ethics? Are there other rules, guidelines, or moral principles that are not captured by the concepts of virtue and piety? What are they? What is missing?
Euthyphro tries to ground morality in the statements of the gods; Aristotle grounds it in human nature (the soul, its purpose and it’s function). Which of these two approaches to grounding ethics seems more likely to succeed as an ethical theory? Do they both miss something? Is there another way to ground our notions of ethics? Why would one or the other fail to provide an adequate theory of ethics?